The Philosophy

I like records that feel like a conversation.  I like it to feel like real people made it.  That doesn't mean it can't be tight, precise and clean, it can, and it doesn't mean it has to be loose and barely in tune, though it can.  I want to know that this artist's record feels different than that artists record, not because they used different software, but because they're different people.

The Goal

It's my goal as a producer to create records that have a unique personality, and that effectively share with the listener all that the artist has to offer.  It's one of my favorite parts of the job, listening to the end result with an artist who feels they've been understood and have created the record they deep down wanted to make.

That being said, there is a general process I have found to be the best way, for me, to bring about this kind of project for the artist I work with.

The Process

First, I like to spend a couple days with the songs, pulling them apart, looking at them from different angles, making sure that each phrase and each melody is the best it can be.  It's easy to fix that stuff at the beginning.  It gets a lot harder once you have a full band's performance recorded and you decide the key is too low and the second verse needs to be a few bars shorter.  Make those cuts when they're cheap!

Once the song is as potent as we can make it we'll "sketch it out", doing a quick recording with the basic structure and melodies.

From here it depends on what kind of record we're making.  If it's a rock and roll record, now is the time for the drums and bass, maybe the guitars and keyboards.  If it's a more intimate songwriter record, we may dive into the root instruments, whether guitars or pianos or whatever, and work to build the foundation for the vocal.

The Song and the Singer

Great records live and die on two things: the song and the singer.  We've already done our work with the song, so when the time feels right we spend as much time as we need to get that great vocal performance.  Some records you add the singer at the end, so they feel like they're singing with the band.  Other times you may do it right at the beginning, and let it guide each little brushstroke of sound that follows.  We do our best to let the song, and singer, tell us how to approach them.

The overdubs are generally the easy part.  It's when you add all the extra layers of guitars, keyboards, background vocals, blips and bleeps, that tie the whole thing together.

Mix and Master

 Once you have all the tracks recorded the song goes to the mix.  Sometimes I mix projects and sometimes I have other mix engineers do it.  It really depends on the time, budget and overall vibe of the project.

Then it gets mastered, which is the final ordering of the songs and leveling them sonically in relation to each other.  From here it's off to the manufacturing plant or iTunes or wherever it's headed.

Finally

Each record is different, because each artist is different.  And the process captures differences is season, weather, general ebbs and flows of life.  All of these things add to the overall achievement that is a great record.  It's my hope that I'm able to guide artists through this process in a way that helps them ultimately create a piece of work they can be proud of for years to come.